Kerry Blasts McCain's "Iraq War mindset"

Remember when John Kerry and John McCain were allies? Friends? Potential ticket-mates? Comity, no more.

"What John McCain has done in his comments** ... is that he has fully embraced willfully, openly, fully embraced the failed, tragic policy of the Bush Administration over the last seven and a half years," Kerry said on a conference call today. "He's really defending a policy that is indefensible. He's proving every day that he doesn't understand Iraq, or the Middle East, or the war on terrorism."

McCain is embracing " George Bush post 9-11 war of choice strategy," of which he is "Washington's biggest supporter." McCain "failed to learned the lessons of 9/11. He is the candidate of the Iraq War mindset, a mindset that completely misunderstands and dangerously underestimates the threats of the 21st century."

** = Actually, these were comments offered by McCain adviser Randy Scheunemann, who said on an earlier conference call that Obama, in commenting on terrorism here, was a "perfect manifestation" of the pre-9/11 mindset. Richard Clarke, the former NSC official in charge of counterterrorism, dismissed the binary choice between treating terrorism as a law enforcement matter or a military matter, and Kerry noted that every Democrat in the Senate voted for war in Afghanistan. Both Clarke and Kerry insisted that Obama's approach to terrorism was comprehensive and not limited to any branch or single function of government: law enforcement, military, intelligence gathering.

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.

Marc Ambinder is a contributing editor at TheAtlantic. He is also a senior contributor at Defense One, a contributing editor at GQ, and a regular contributor at The Week.